Survival of the Fittest
by DK1
Summary: Psychics have always held an advantage over Fighters...but evolution has taken its toll upon both...and only the fittest survive.


**SURVIVAL**

**OF THE FITTEST**

By DK

_Prologue_

The lonely, empty dojo was silent, save for the constant creaking of the rusted chains which stubbornly grasped onto the stone-filled bags they held suspended over the dirty, hardboard floor. A scared gray mouse scurried into a teeth-mark outlined mousehole, poking its head out a second later, its whiskers twitching nervously, as if in anticipation, as it kept its beady, black eyes focused on the bolted door.

Sunlight streamed into the room, lighting up the darkened corners and crevices. Slowly the room came out of its hibernation. The light glinted off a few katanas learning against the far wall. A pair of red, worn-down sparring gloves rested contentedly under the shade of an enormous punching bag, torn and bent in many places. Various padded mats lay strewn across the room in different places, the stuffing leaking out of more than a few. A long, wooden staff was propped up beside the door, like a guard to the entrance.

The bags continued to sway. _Creak, creak._

The mouse nibbled on a piece of moldy cheese, eyes darting back and forth. Suddenly its nose shot into the air, testing it, tasting it. It lowered its nose, curious. A new smell had entered the atmosphere.

Then there was an unexpected gust of wind, only much more powerful, like a miniature tornado roaring outside the small dojo. The windows blew open, the tattered curtains fluttering like a nervous flock of Spearow, the ceiling light came on with a _click_ and swung crazily around, lighting different parts of the room, and then_the door._

As the mouse looked on in absolute terror, completely frozen in its place, the doors crashed open as if hit by a grenade. There was a brilliant flash of white light as sunlight burst in the dojo like an explosion. For a moment, after the few seconds of chaos, all was calm. The mouse relaxed. But it was only temporary, for the wind shifted, and mouse tensed up again. It was certain it could now smell a being, but it simply couldn't identify what it was

From nowhere, a brown blur shot into the room, its purple skirt flapping wildly as it ran with speeds exceeding that of a Rapidash. Then, only five steps into the room, the swift figure elevated into the air, defying all proverbial laws of gravity as it hung in midair for what seemed like hours. One gloved hand was outstretched in front of the rest of its body, and it hurtled like a bullet towards the other end of the room. Finally it reached its destination: the ridiculously large punching bag that hung at the end of the room. With a surprisingly loud cry for such a small, compact animal, the flying figure began to punch like no tomorrow, landing blow upon blow upon blow, not stopping once, refusing to break the steady rhythm of gloved fist against hard material. It continued to float in midair as it did this, mouth wide open, yelling furiously, pounding the bag with air-bending punches that were leaving marks, giant welts, upon the bag's maimed blue skin.

Finally the punching demon stopped, its feet returning to the ground once again as it blew away the smoke that curled from its knuckles in thin, gray wisps. "DAMN, is it good to be back!" the figure whooped as it raised its fist in the air, as if signaling a victory over an opponent. "Whoohoo!" The figure skipped around the room, inspecting everything, reaching out every now and then with a gloved hand to touch things that it had grown to love over the years, familiar things that had faithfully remained here to be used again.

Suddenly the figure skidded to a halt, scratching the back of its head. "HeyI wonder why the others're so late?"

The doors flew open a second time, and another tan figure, even swifter than the first, cartwheeled into the room, performing a difficult and very complicated series of flips, somersaults, and twists. Finally it landed squarely on both spiked feet upon the solid floor, and it raised its three-fingered hands high into the air before launching itself, a brown rocket, towards the immense bulk of a bag that was still smoking from the blows of the first figure. The figure shot out one of its extremely long legs, spiked toes aiming straight for the bag, spelling out the bag's death in the form of skillfully executed flying side kick. With a deep grunt, the foot collided with the bag. There was an explosion of stuffing and a flurry of white material as it sprayed out of the large gash created by the force of the kick. The foot had imbedded itself into the bag, and with a crack, the rusty chains finally gave in, releasing the bag from its captivity. The bag touched ground for the first time in a hundred and forty years as the figure brought it down with a great crash.

The first figure was silent for a moment as it watched this fascinating spectacle from a distance. The gloves were limp at its sides, shoulders heaving, eyes blinking. Then before the second figure could react, the first figure was all over it, squeezing and hugging crying and crushing the breath out of its lungs. "Omigod, Bruce, it's been such a long time—I missed you so much—"

At first the second figure was wide-eyed in surprise, but then the wide eyes disappeared as a broad smiled stretched across its face. It lifted a long arm to encircle the first figure in a warm embrace as it said, "YeahI missed you too, Jackie."

Jackie nodded and sniffed. "Forty long years since we've last seen each other. So what have you been up to, you rascal?"

Bruce only smiled and shrugged. "Oh, just training and traveling, seeing the sights, writing music every time I get some spare time."

Jackie punched him playfully on the arm. "Always the musician."

He grinned. "Yeah, well you know me. Man, does it feel great to be back"

"You could say that again," Jackie agreed. "Why, the place is just the way I remembered it! Nothing's changedthat is, the condition's gotten a bit worse, but that's no problem. We could fix it up before the others get here."

"Nah," Bruce replied, waving the suggestion away. "Let's wait for them to get here and see it, too. Then we'll all fix it up together. Whaddaya say?" He gazed into her intense, blue eyes.

She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and smiled. "Why not?" she answered as she took his arm in hers, settling down on an old sofa that stood adjacent to the entrance, and together the two fighters, a Hitmonlee and a Hitmonchan, awaited the arrival of their comrades.

~~ ¨ ~~ 

_Chapter One: Consequences of Isolation_

**~~ Hitmonlee ~~**

POW! WHACK!

"Weakling! Is that the best you can do?"

"Alright, you asked for it, you overweight Snorlax!"

BAM! POUGH!

"Do you call this fighting?"

SMACK! CRUNCH!

"Take this!"

The small clenched fist shot like a missile through the air, catching the unsuspecting Machoke in the jaw. The superpower Pokémon's reflexes were sharp, however, and it had only struck a glancing blow. Nevertheless, the damage had been done.

I smiled to myself. This was getting interesting. Perhaps the young Machop would win after all. Machoke wiped the blood that trickled down his chin from his lips. Despite his injury, he managed to smirk at the young Machop that dared to challenge him. "Fool," he sneered. "You merely caught me off guard. That won't be happening again." To prove his point, Machoke drew his arm back, energy gathering at his golf ball-sized knuckles.

Machop's eyes narrowed. "It already has." Machop's entire body suddenly burst aflame in a bluish-gray glow, transparent enough to see the outline and the intense brown eyes glaring through the energy. In turn, Machoke's body was covered by reddish-maroon energy, obscuring his tough, muscular frame. With an angry cry, Machoke charged forward, shooting his arm towards Machop, his fist trailing white energy.

Machop awaited the blow, and knew he wouldn't be fast enough to dodge it. Only one other choice. As the fist approached, Machop quickly set his feet at 90-degree angles as his powerful arms blurred to the front of his torso to block the punch. Machop grunted as a searing pain exploded in his arms where the attack had connected. It felt as if his forearms had been broken in half. As for the punch, he may have been trying to contain a rocket with his bare hands. The force of it caused him to be shoved backward, his feet sliding on the hardwood floor as he squeezed his eyes tight from the pain. The friction between his feet and the floor had been more than painful. Smoke curled from them like big, gray snakes.

Before Machop could recover, a vicelike grip clamped onto his neck and jerked him into the air as if he were a toy. As he struggled to free his windpipe of this iron hold, he stared down the long, rippling arm to the sneering, grinning face of Machoke. Machoke was taking great pleasure in slowly squeezing the life out of the little Fighting Pokémon, relishing his victory, when a firm, powerful voice thundered, "Let him go, Machoke." The incredibly strong Machamp, dressed in the classic black-and-white uniform of traditional referees, held up his hand.

Machoke, the ugly grin still leering on his face, released the small Pokémon as Machop landed awkwardly on his rump, gasping and choking for breath. This stopped abruptly, and he quickly got to his feet to have a staring contest with Machoke.

"Youwon," Machop finally said in acknowledgment. Despite his comment, he refused to let his voice waver or sound remotely pitiful, nor did he allow his eyes to stray from Machoke's gaze.

Smirky grin. "Glad to see you're finally fessing up to your losses, little one. There'll be more matches like this one, believe me. Maybe then your smart little mouth will shut up, and then you'll have more time to train and less to chat." Before Machop could reply, Machoke sauntered away to join some others, who congratulated him on his victory.

Machop stared at his back for a long while, then slowly turned away. Machamp opened his mouth to speak, but I shook my head. No doubt some depressing thoughts were running through his mind. It would be best to let him cool off and give him time to think, to meditate. I'd had quite a few losses myself as a rookie, and I remembered the discouragement of constantly losing battles against a tougher, larger, stronger opponent. I nodded to Jackie to signal to her that it would be of big help to Machop if she'd talk to him about the match and offer him some pointers. Discouragement and self-pity never got anyone anywhere. And it certainly wouldn't earn Machop more than another beating.

I, and most of the veteran fighters in the dojo, knew that from experience.

I stretched my long, powerful legs and hopped up off the bleachers. Machop would always have Tyrogue, Poliwrath, and Heracross to comfort him. I had no one.

Awhile back, when I was still young and naïve, I had made many foolish mistakes. I thought I didn't need friends, didn't have any dependencies, didn't owe anything to anyone. I despised the thought of having proverbial "crutches" that would support me, and without them, that I'd be helpless. I reasoned that I was strong enough to venture out on my own. I wasn't an infant, and the dojo had seemed more like a prison than a home, Machamp more like a stern boss than a caring friend, Jackie more like an annoying female than a fierce—yet beautiful—acquaintance. But I hadn't paid the attention I had needed to for Machamp's lectures, nor did I remember my weaknesses and strengths within myself and my Fighting heritage.

Then the Psychics had come.

Ridiculously powerful beings I could not harm no matter how fast, how strong, how alert I was. They were always one step ahead of me, one rung above me. I'd been imprisoned, beaten, brainwashed, and thrown off cliffs. But those hadn't been even relatively near the worst of my injuries; my right leg had been completely removed from my body. Without my legs, I'd been completely helpless. I couldn't run, I couldn't fight. Hell, I couldn't even stand up. Followed by the laughter of the Psychics, even louder than a normal laugh because their laughs echoed within my head for decades, I crawled, my insides torn inside out by grief and sorrow, back to the dojo's front door, collapsing upon the steps I'd traveled upon so many years and had played on as a young child. Machamp had found me then, the Prodigal Son, near death and in extremely bad physical condition, and even worse mental condition. My speech had been a mindless babble for weeks, and both friend and foe from the dojo had visited me inside Machamp's private quarters. I was told later that even the elusive Machoke had come in. That fact surprised me more than anything.

After months of rehab and recovery, I'd managed to hop around on my one good leg, and my memory was returning. Strangely enough, the close encounter with Death itself had transformed me into a completely new person. No one but Machamp and Jackie had expected me to live, and many still say that I had actually "died" and had come back to life. My "death" had changed Jackie in ways I never thought it would. She became more closer, more intimate with me, sharing my own fears and joys in life, and helping me out in whatever I tried to accomplish, with the greatest of difficulty. Damn, I missed that leg!

Eventually, once I was healthy enough, Machamp gave me a special herb passed down from his forefathers that would allow my lost limb to grow back. Although the second leg was never as powerful as the first, it remained a leg, fully functional. And attached to me.

I learned my lesson the hard way. Not many Pokémon could say that, I knew, and many fighters, rookies and veterans alike, were still afraid to step outside the protective gates.

I had always been separated from the rest of the fighters, and even today, I still was, but in a calm, peaceful way that the fighters understood and respected. I was given alot of room, and a lot of independence as well. I was a strong challenger, even to Machamp, and my scars had long healed.

Well, at least my external ones.

With a sigh, I began to head over towards Jackie, who had one powerful arm around Machop's sagging shoulders and the other extended high into the air.

I heard conversation between them, and it became clearer as I approached them. "I know you can do it," she finished, flashing her brilliant smile and causing Machop to grin.

"You're right," he agreed. "I'll be sure to remember in the future when I train." With that, he headed away to join his comrades.

The two of us watched him go. The liveliness and energy in him had returned, and he had become his cheerful, normal self again. I turned to Jackie. "What was that all about?"

She shrugged, still smiling that lovely smile as she watched him as a mother would her own child. "Nothing. Just a few words of encouragement"

I nodded. "That can make all the difference."


End file.
